


Even The Smallest Gestures

by Zerotaste



Category: A3! (Video Game)
Genre: Blood and Injury, Gen, Non-Graphic Violence, Pre-Canon, Rated For Violence, Spies & Secret Agents, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-27
Updated: 2020-05-27
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:46:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24404518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zerotaste/pseuds/Zerotaste
Summary: December is an excellent agent on all technical levels and the thrill of a mission is enough to keep him awake during everything but stake outs. The thing he knows April is mad about is something he doesn’t want to speak about. He can work around it, he has until now and he just needs to be a little more alert to compensate for it. Keeping his lips closed he hopes that rather than mention it, April will just tend to him and drop it.“I’m giving you a chance to tell him first.” He comments, bringing up the exact conversation December does not want to have. “But if you won’t, I will.”
Relationships: Mikage Hisoka & Utsuki Chikage
Comments: 6
Kudos: 32





	Even The Smallest Gestures

**Author's Note:**

> It's December and April rather than Hisoka and Chikage so very clearly if you don't know about that whole deal you likely don't want the spoilers that come with this territory.
> 
> I wanted to explore a couple of things with this. Both my take on Hisoka/December's eye cause I've had various mentions of it in drafts for a while and never just, actually gone into it and I love seeing people's takes on his eye so I wanted go into it in a fic too. And also the the fact August saved them and loves them dearly and they were a happy family and all that but uh, July literally described their training as hell so there's at least a little bit here that's messed up.

“Both of you,” No time is spared for details as August’s voice comes through his earpiece. “First floor, door to the right side of the office entrance. Hurry.”

Mapping out how far he is from there, scanning his surroundings and acknowledging who he has to go through to get there he nods.

“Twenty seconds.” If he can run straight through them without fighting it’ll be less. Jump to the hand railing in the other side of the stairs to the floor and then it’ll be easy.

“Roger that.” That’s April, voice demanding and slightly laboured, he’s running too. Unlike August who’s stationed a number of kilometres away watching through body cameras and trackers, he’d ended up in the middle of things alongside December. Things often end up like this, there are some missions where August’s brain is more use calling the shots. “That door’s blastproof isn’t it, oi sleepyhead if you don’t shut it properly-”

He bites back a retort at that first part, April’s being one hundred percent serious and with the comment about the door being blast proof, he can guess what this is about now. Dammit. None of the men around him seem to know someone has some form of explosive activated in here, shooting and lunging at him as he darts past he dodges as best he can, a knife coming out as one gets a little too close for safety. He has to accept the loss of it as it remains stuck in the assailants neck while he keeps running. Knives can be replaced, his life and limbs can’t be. He needs to get through that door.

Ahead of him, that’s April isn’t it? Until things had gone awry this had been an underground action with an annoyingly strict dress code and unfortunately when limbs are moving as fast as they are, it’s a little hard to make out one suit from the next. He wishes he could take his own off honestly. It’s stuffy and strict and hinders his combat somewhat. Movement on the left, brown hair, not April. He doesn’t have to think twice before lifting his gun.

A shot sails past his right ear as he pulls his own trigger, pain blossoming through his arm at the same time. Whipping his head around far enough to see behind him with his good eye, a body falls to the floor. Wasting breath on thanking April right now would be reckless, so would checking on his injury. No one knows exactly how long they have left nor how large the blast will be.

Gritting his teeth, the strain on his arm as he catches the railing sends a wave of pain through his arm worse than the initial one. Pain doesn’t matter though. Survival does. This will just be another scar among many once it’s patched up. Feet hitting the floor he makes a run for it, following the tall, slender figure of April through the door and throwing himself back against it

Heat radiates through the heavy door as it slams shut just in time. The sounds of infrastructure creaking and crashing to the ground follow the initial blast, whoever planted the device must not have wanted any survivors. Despite the adrenaline pumping through his veins and the blood soaking through his suit, he has his footage of those in attendance and recordings of enough of the proceeding. The Organisation will be able to piece things together from that. Mission success and as close of a call as it was they’re safe, kind of, but they need to keep moving. That was close, almost too close.

“Nobody told me there was a bomb.” He complains, breaking into a sprint behind April. 

“No one knew, it wasn’t ours.” April comments dryly. “If we’d known that would have gone a lot differently.” 

There are many things today that should and could have gone differently. But that’s in the past now, the facts right now are that they’re both alive and that thankfully the building had been built knowing that at some point someone may disagree with what the venue is being used for. Without those measures both of them would have joined the rest of the attendees inside.

Grass underfoot turns to dirt road turns to concrete as they move through the shadows. Neither speak as they focus on getting to their destination. Once a small roadside café, the place had been long abandoned before August had discovered it and pinned it as the most convenient meeting spot if things tonight were to go wrong. It’s simple, derelict but out of the way enough that it should get looked over in an initial sweep on the area. 

Reaching the door first he can hear April behind him trying to make up the distance he’d lost. There’s always a rush of satisfaction in the fact he can outrun him, despite the fact he really doesn’t like running. Opening with a creak he’s greeted by dust and spider’s webs decorating the front of house area. Pulling a face he ducks his head, half hoping April walks right into what he’s dodged as he finds his way to the back office. The one place they’d risked cleaning up just in case one of them had ended up here severely injured and requiring some place semi-sterile.

“We’ve both arrived. Eta?” April’s voice is breathy as he contacts August.

“Fifty minutes.” That seems like too long but as he flops down over the unused desk it also seems like the perfect amount of time for a nap. “Lay low you two. April keep him awake.”

“Don’t wanna.” He grumbles. He might fall asleep anyway, April can carry him easily enough.

A glare is shot at him, which really makes it all the more tempting to nod off just to get on his nerves. Hand reaching under his collar, April fiddles with his microphone, a faint clicking sound coming as it switches off. He barely has time to wonder why before that hand’s reaching out towards his own, repeating the action and as it happens he hears the faint static of his tiny ear piece die. Silently April shuts off their cameras as well.

“Give me a look at your arm.” Oh, that makes sense. The last thing they want is for the wound to be worse than expected and for August to worry even more. He’s in for a lecture later regardless, he can do without that coming at him remotely too. No matter how many missions they’ve been on with just the two of them now, he reverts to that same worrywart he had been during their first alone together whenever something goes wrong like this.

Sitting upright he winces, the adrenaline that had drowned out the pain is fast wearing off. He doesn’t feel light headed so it can’t have been too severe but as his jacket and blazer are peeled off the fibres stick to the congealed blood, causing it to flow anew as they’re torn away.

“It doesn’t seem too deep.” December had figured as much, more serious wounds take far more of a toll on his body. He’s been through a lot, both in the field and during training. If this was enough to seriously affect him, he’d never have gotten to this point. August had been able to tell he was hardy from the start, those who aren’t simply disappear.

There’s a frown on April’s face as he reaches into his jacket. He can tell he’s is on edge and he knows it’s only in part due to the turn the mission had taken. December is an excellent agent on all technical levels and the thrill of a mission is enough to keep him awake during everything but stake outs. The thing he knows April is mad about is something he doesn’t want to speak about. He can work around it, he has until now and he just needs to be a little more alert to compensate for it. Keeping his lips closed he hopes that rather than mention it, April will just tend to him and drop it.

“I’m giving you a chance to tell him first.” He comments, bringing up the exact conversation December does not want to have. “But if you won’t, I will.”

A hiss escapes his lips as a small alcohol pad is wiped over his wound. They can’t carry many medical supplies with them on missions like this but at August’s insistence, enough to clean and temporarily close are wound are always hidden away in a pocket. They’re far from medical professionals but their training had covered how to patch up themselves up in a pinch, often using the other’s wounds from harsh drills that had felt a little too much like their lives were actually on the line. They’re lucky April’s shot had thrown off the aim off the man who’d snuck up on him.

“’s not that bad.” It is and he knows it.

His sight has long been deteriorating in his right eye but lately it’s gotten a lot worse. Back when he’d first been picked up it wasn’t anything of concern, he doubts The Organisation would have taken him in if they’d known about it. When his sight had first started deteriorating, August had researched what he could and couldn’t come up with anything they could do without alerting The Organisation itself. Them finding out may have been as good as a death sentence. He’d just had to cope with it and hope it wouldn’t get so bad that the eye lost all vision. Up until now he hasn’t had any issue with it on missions, this is the first time.

“You’ll drag us down if we have to watch your back for you.” It’s true and he knows it, he also knows that this is April’s way of being worried about him. “And he’ll never forgive himself or me if you died because of it.”

He’ll just have to get better at watching his own back, make up for his blind side by honing the rest of his instincts. The last thing he wants is for The Organisation to drop him because they think he’s useless. Or worse. Perhaps he knows too much for them to just let him go like that. Even if they did, while he’s now an adult and could figure out how to survive on his own, he couldn’t bear losing April and August. He can’t risk his family being torn from him because his body has decided to betray him.

Silence falls between them as butterfly stitches close his wound, likely to be replaced with more permanent ones later on. The longer it goes on, the more the atmosphere bothers him. Holding up a hand over his good eye he shakes his head. At this level of low light it’s getting to the point where he may as well not even try.

“How bad is it?” A bandage, not quite large enough but it’ll have to do with what they have to work with, is unwrapped. “Don’t lie.”

“Bad.” He really doesn’t want to suffer the lecture August will give him for his misstep and for keeping how bad his eye is getting from him.

He loves August, he’s his family. April is too but August had been the one who had truly saved him. His way of saving him hasn’t always been the easiest, he’d given him a chance to survive but December had been through another type of Hell because of it. Coming back to their room after training, barely able to walk, collapsing as soon as he was through the door had him wondering if survival was really worth it at times. Despite what the life he’d introduced him to consists of, he knows August’s heart has always been in the right place and that without him he would have died freezing and alone. Even when he’s lecturing them for their mistakes he knows it’s from a place of worry and concern. That’s what family do right? It’s not like he knows any better but from what he’s learnt, you argue sometimes, sometimes you get told off but at the end of the day they’re the people who you love no matter what.

“He’s not going to be happy.” April tells him what he doesn’t need to hear, still clearly annoyed himself at being left in the dark. “He already worries about you enough.”

“I know.” He feels bitter, just because April met August before him doesn’t mean he gets to play his favourite like this. “He’ll be mad at you too for turning off the comms.”

“I know.”

It’s then that he realises the real reason April did it. It wasn’t to hide a potentially horrific wound, nor entirely to scold him about keeping his eye’s condition a secret before August can. If August has two of them to tell off, it will be shared between them and he won’t have to bear the brunt of it on his own. December knows April loves August more than anything, it’s obvious, so for him to sacrifice also being picked at like he will is big. Rather than saying anything he lets a small smile grace his lips.

He knows that after August is done with that, he’ll have him attempting yet again to see if he can find something to stop or slow his eyes degeneration. April will sit there on the dusty couch in their makeshift hideout in this country, rolling his eyes as he pretends to focus on his laptop. Regardless of what’s to come, he can’t take back this gesture that he’s made now.

**Author's Note:**

> Second gen fic ever and it's another gekka fic. I can't stop thinking about them ever please send help.
> 
> So basically yeah I believe it to be a degenerative condition. He was likely using it to some degree in his Playback but even then it was lighter than his other eye. Later he grew out his fringe, while he was still active as a spy because there was not time between August's death and him joining Mankai for it to grow so at some point between his playback and a few months before August's death I believe that it reached a point of being completely blind or have gotten to the point where it essentially was. I believe when he entered the organisation it really wasn't an issue at all.


End file.
